A Song of Ice
by GenghisQuan
Summary: An AU wherein the climax took a turn for the tragic - Anna froze before she could reach anyone before Elsa's eyes, causing Elsa to lose control completely for a few seconds. What consequences does this spell for the survivors of Arendelle and its neighboring kingdoms? Seven vignettes for seven characters. Somewhat of a crossover, but publishing there would spoil things.
1. Anna

**Chapter 1**

**Anna**

_Left._

_Now right._

_Now left._

_That's it, one step at a-_

Anna shivered, almost stumbling as she felt the sensation twist up her spine and into her heart, like spikes - _no. Not like spikes._ Like a simpler time, more than a decade ago, when she and Elsa were playing, building a snowman. Anna had been searching for a pair of rocks that would make the perfect buttons, when suddenly there was the tingly, _tickly _sensation of snow being stuffed down the back of her coat and a teasing but never mean-spirited giggle. Yes, that's it. _Tickly_. Happy thoughts. Happy thoughts to keep her going forward. _Just keep walking, just keep walking…_

Another shiver, even worse than the last one, jammed its way up her body, forcing her to stop. _No. It can't end like this. _Anna tried to call up another memory, another happy thought, but it was just so difficult when the details were so fuzzy. All she could remember was being happy at..._something_, but the specifics disintegrated like a snowflake caught in a fiery grip, like having a word on the tip of the tongue but being unable to spit it out. So instead Anna bundled her arms together, grit her teeth in resolve, and then took another step forward, then another. The howling snow was blinding, and the wind bit at her exposed face, but she could barely make out a moving shape thundering toward her.

_Kristoff…_

Two, three more steps ahead. Another shiver, frigid, unyielding.

_Yes, think of Kristoff. You have to get to Kristoff._ Another step. _Not of Hans._ And another. _Hans, who had bedazzled her._ That's it, one more. _Hans, who had charmed her._ You got this. _Hans, who had betrayed her._

It was harder now. The shivers were becoming more frequent and severe, such that they were not so much localized shivers as spasms of needling pain all over her body, like some frost giant had seized her and was driving a corkscrew into her spine-

_No, happy thoughts._ The first snowball of winter. Roasting chestnuts inside the great hall. Hot chocolate, the beans from the Summer Isles, the machine from Wesselton, the sweet sugary garnish from the Westerlands. Elsa begging to try their father's warmer-upper drink, looking quizzically at the clear liquid, taking a tiny sip before spitting it all across the dining room table. Oh, how they had all laughed then. Simpler times...

"Kristoff," Anna called out weakly. Was that him calling back? She wasn't sure. Another two steps, and finally her legs gave out. _No. Keep going._ Ice-skating. _Remember ice-skating? _She tried to remember. There was something there. The details were fuzzy. But there was a fall. And someone - Dad? No, he was entertaining Wesselton. Mom? Overseeing dinner. The servants? No, too large.

"Elsa," she whispered through chattering teeth. From her vantage point, Anna could see her sister, right in the center of the storm where it was thickest. _Wait, wasn't the storm supposed to calmest at the center?_ And something at the back of her mind rolled its eyes and noted that of course _now _was the time to recall her childhood grammar tutorials, before moving on to the important bit. Yes, Elsa had helped her up then. But she was far away now, and with..._Hans_?

"_If only there was someone out there who loved you."_

Anna did not know whether the shivers triggered the memory, or the memory the shivers. All she knew was suddenly feeling as if a jagged mirror shard slid up inside her chest cavity. She clawed at the ground with numb fingers, trying to climb back up to her feet, but her limbs kept sliding against the ice, as if the gloves and boots no longer held traction, as if they had frozen over…

_Oh no._

"Anna!"

_Kristoff._ Yes, that was him! How did Olaf describe him? Like a...a "pungent reindeer-king?" She could see him now, atop Sven. She looked back to Elsa again - and to Hans. He was saying something to her.

"He's lying," Anna wanted to say. "Whatever he's telling you, don't believe him!" But her teeth were chattering too quickly to make any sounds now. She was helpless to see the prince's words worm their way into Elsa's heart, just as they had wormed their way into her own.

And then the storm stopped.

Indeed, it seemed as if the world had taken pity upon Princess Anna of Arendelle, and time itself stopped for her. She could see it clearly now.

Hans, grim determination on his face as he drew his sword.

Kristoff, grim determination on his face as he pushed Sven into an even faster gallop.

And now that the snowstorm no longer raged on, no longer obscured everything, Elsa's gaze meeting her own, across the sea of ice. Her elder sister's expression changing from one of grief and devastation, to shock and relief, to outright horror as Princess Anna of Arendelle froze solid before her eyes.


	2. Wesselton

**Chapter 2**

**Wesselton**

Though it was summer in Wesselton, the Duke still shivered. Bad memories, it was. Of the cold night where the snows fell a hundred feet deep, of the long walk across the sea of ice, of the _things _that had followed them out of the ice-cased ruins of Castle Arendelle, of the unnatural sorcery that had started it all. As his carriage rumbled down the cobblestone path, the Duke paused in thought to open a curtain, looking outside to reassure himself that yes, the sun was up and the grass still green, that the winter was now behind him. Yes, here he was safe. Such things would never have happened in Wesselton, for here they were civilized, and the only thing they burned apart from witches were more witches.

"Are you cold, m'lord?"

"Hand me my cloak, Franz," the Duke replied. The bodyguard tensed, then did as told, draping it around the Duke's shoulders. It was not his original job. Rather, it was his brother's former job, before the man had succumbed to the unnatural cold that pursued the few survivors all the way beyond the Frostfang mountains. The Duke felt it, too, but decorum would not permit him to show any emotion. Stiff upper lip, and all that, which had gotten them through the desperate flight from old Arendelle, even when it became difficult to keep calm and carry on during the latter parts of the journey, when the frozen returned. The fire kept them at bay, as the survivors soon learned, and the Duke shivered again as the images returned.

Nothing good ever came of dalliances with sorcery.

Alternate solutions were needed, beyond merely identifying the witch by her appearance - there was nary the slightest mole or pimple on "Queen Elsa," much less full blown warts, and women, self-centered and emotional as they were, could not be trusted to put aside their conceit for a second for the good of the kingdom and just line up in the public square to hop on a scale with a duck on the other end. No, what the world needed was a way to neutralize the witch's powers permanently.

Which was why he was on his way to a particular town he never cared for, an old town, full of tenured bearded men in their ivory towers and idealistic young fools out to change the world. The Duke had always scoffed at this. The world was as it is. There was no use changing it to fit ideals of justice or equality or solidarity. Only in changing it to fit your own needs.

"We have arrived, m'lord."

"Let me down, Franz."

"Lord Duke Wesselton, what a pleasant surprise. The Citadel welcomes you," said the ancient who stood ready to greet him. The Duke was not tall, but this old man almost met him at eye level, hunched over as he was, although it was uncertain whether this was due to the weight of age or the decorated chain links hung around his neck to symbolize his mastery of knowledge. "To what do we owe this pleasure?"

"Suffice to say, archmaester, that in my old age I have found myself pondering the question of my legacy," the Duke replied. "And in my ponderings," he said, suppressing another involuntary shiver, "I have concluded that there can be no greater beneficiary of my wealth than higher education."

"I understand," the archmaester said, smiling. "Come, let us walk. Word can take long to reach us here, but the ravens have been coming from the North."

"Dark wings, dark words," the Duke replied. He could have sworn that one particular link on the archmaester's chains, one that seemed like steel but shone like fire, was glistening in the light. "We lost a lot of good men out there."

"My condolences for your losses," said the archmaester. "Rest assured, my lord. We share a dream, and one day we will see it through."


	3. Elsa

**Chapter 3**

**Elsa**

_What happened…_

Queen Elsa of Arendell climbed groggily to her feet, holding a hand up to her pounding head as she tried to make sense of her surroundings. Something had happened before the blackout. Hans...something with Hans. But he was gone now. She looked down. An arm, still clutching an ornate sword hilt which formerly held a master-crafted blade that was now shattered into a thousand pieces, lay by her feet, encased in a thin layer of frost. But something was off about it. Elsa leaned in slowly, getting a closer look, then gave a startled yelp and kicked it away when she realized that some of the icicles stuck to the limb seemed to be growing out of the musculature itself.

_What have I done?_

Queen Elsa of Arendelle took a wistful look at the scene of desolation around her and sighed. How did it come to this? The ice took everything, roads, trees, stones, walls, houses, ships, _people_. It locked them inside its frozen gates, gripped them tightly in its dagger claws, swallowed them between its clenched teeth, leaving her the queen of this kingdom of isolation. But all of that paled in comparison to what she saw next.

"Anna? Anna!" Elsa cried, running frantically to the icy-blue statue. "No, Anna, not again!" By the time she reached her sister, now frozen forever, her legs gave out, and she collapsed against her, holding on to her shoulders in an embrace that would never be returned. "I'm sorry, Anna," she sobbed. "I never meant to hurt you, Anna. I'm sorry. I was trying to protect you. Please, believe me, I...I was...I just...oh, it's all my fault!" The guilt surged into her heart, like the crashing wave that had brought down their parents' vessel. Like the time a stray frost bolt had hit Anna's head, prompting that fateful visit to the Troll Kingdom. Like the first time she had to close the door when Anna came knocking to play for fear of it happening again. She could tell Anna was hurting. She could tell Anna longed for the closeness they used to have. And every time she told herself, _just one more day, until I learn to control my powers_.

And now that chance would never come again.

"_Yes I wanna build a snowman..." _

At first Elsa wondered who was singing, before realizing that the voice was, in fact, hers. "_I'm sorry that it took so long…I didn't know I needed you…I really do…and now you're gone…"_ Every single closed door and dejected goodbye from childhood replayed in her mind. "_Please, just ask me once more, just one more time…I promise I'll open the door…"_ Her voice was quivering now, and she prayed while trying to control her sobbing enough. _Gentle Mother, Strength of Women, Help our daughters through this fray. Please, if you can hear me above..._

"Elsa?"

Anna's statue remained frozen.

"Elsa, are you there?"

"Olaf?"

"Hey, it…" the little snowman stopped when he saw what had happened. He opened his mouth, as if to say something, but nothing came out. What seemed like a silent eternity passed between them. "Hey, Elsa…"

"I'm fine, Olaf," Elsa replied, sniffing as she wiped at her eyes. She looked upon Anna's face, the rictus of heartbreak forever etched upon it, and caressed it with a gentle palm, applying force only to scrape off a frozen tear that had congealed on Anna's cheek.

"Uh, are you sure-"

"Yes, Olaf, I'm fine." _Don't let them in, don't let them see. Conceal, don't feel. _"Come on, let's go back to the castle."

"But, ah, shouldn't we-"

"_You_ can stay if you want. I'm going back." It came out more harshly than she intended, but at this point she didn't care any more. _Couldn't _care any more. Not in the sense of apathy, but because she allowed herself to... _If I look back, I am lost,_ Elsa thought, forcing the tears back in. _Oh, Anna...maybe it was better this way. At least now I can't hurt you any more._

But she did look back to say goodbye one last time.

"_Yes, I wanna build a snowman…"_

The next few days were a blur. Elsa barely remembered what she was doing. It was like watching a stage play when you were distracted by other things, and you were tuning out what the actors were doing and saying because you were chatting up your friends. What she did remember, however, was the lead-up to everything. She had panicked, running out to the frozen fjord as the snowstorm intensified. Hans had followed her at some point. She remembered the pit in her stomach as he caught up and informed her of what happened to Anna. Or rather, what he _said _happened. Elsa sighed. She didn't know what left a fouler taste in her mouth, that he had said this in an attempt to break her, or that it had almost worked. What she did know was that when the snow stopped, she met her sister's gaze, and in an instant everything made sense. The prince's eagerness to marry. The way he stopped talking as soon as he could see the same thing. And then...the storm truly raged on.

Most of her subjects had joined Anna's fate, with the exception of a lucky few who were able to take cover - or rather, just happened to be behind it at that precise moment. Those few were too concerned with fleeing to entertain any thoughts that perhaps killing her would end it all. Which was fortunate, Elsa supposed. Or not, as now she had to bear the guilt by herself.

"Hey, Elsa...I found a bunch of lingonberries by the icebank."

"Thank you, Olaf," Elsa replied, smiling hollowly as she accepted the food. The little snowman bowed, then began walking off. Elsa never knew where he would go, only that he would somehow always be there whenever she needed something that he could provide. A sudden thought struck her. "Olaf, wait," Elsa called out. "Can I ask you something?"

The little snowman stopped mid-stride.

"Ask away, my queen," he replied, executing a smart about-face and snapping off a salute.

"How...how did you become alive?"

"Hmm?" A quizzical expression came upon him. "Iono," he replied, shrugging. "One moment, nothing. And the next, I just _was_. It really was the most peculiar thing. I was standing there on a mountain side. And then I started wandering around. And then later, I ran into your, uh…"

"It's okay, Olaf, you can say it. You ran into my _sister_." Elsa closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. "Thank you, Olaf. Go do...whatever it is that you do."

It had taken a few shots of the good stuff from her father's private vodka cabinet, but finally Elsa got up the courage to return to the spot where it all began. She nearly got a heart attack when the statue of Anna was no longer there, but then Olaf had shown up and silently led her back to the castle. Specifically, to Anna's old bedchamber, where she now rested forever.

"It didn't feel right to leave her out there," the little snowman explained sheepishly. Elsa didn't say anything. She left the room brushing snow from her sleeves, noting that she will be more careful the next time she felt inclined to hug a snowman. And in hindsight, she was thankful. Hadn't this whole mess started because she used her powers without understanding how to control it? She would not make that mistake again. No, she would not touch Anna, not until she understood fully how her powers worked.

Which was why she was now standing in the castle courtyard, the frozen body of...of _someone _in front of her. Based on the clothing, it was not one of her subjects, but perhaps the manservant to one of the guests to her coronation. No, she would be careful now.

Conceal, don't feel. Keep it in. Hold it back. Close the door. Now open it, just a crack...enough to feel her power flurrying through the air into the ground, for her soul to spiral in frozen fractals all around, for her thoughts to crystallize like an icy blast...

***CRACK***

Elsa gasped. Given all that life had dumped upon her, she hadn't expected it to work. But it was working! The icy shell surrounding her test subject cracked and splintered. First an arm moved, then a leg, then everything as he burst out like a gargoyle from the her bedtime stories. Something nagged at her, though. Was his skin so pale before, and so taut? And she would have sworn his eyes were brown, not blue, and especially not such a piercing blue; if ice could burn, Elsa was certain it would be that color. It felt like the air was chillier as well, but Elsa shrugged it off. The cold never bothered her anyway.

Then the man screamed an otherworldly scream that almost burst Elsa's eardrums. Defensive reflex took over, and she encased the man in ice again. But this time, it hadn't taken hold, and soon he was threatening to break out of his cage, shriveled and frostbitten muscles straining to free themselves from their icy prison. "No," Elsa whispered. "No, no, no!" She hurled another ice blast at him, but he had shrugged it off, reaching out with his hands to throttle her, as if to inflict a last measure of vengeance one the one who had left him in this state.

Much to Elsa's surprise, it was Olaf who had come to the rescue. She didn't know how the little snowman did it, but he had grabbed a candlestick from the table, lit it up, and placed himself between her and the...the otherworldly _thing_. Upon seeing the fire, it shrank back, snarling in rage. That had given her inspiration, and her next ice blast pushed it into the fireplace that she kept lit more for sentimental reasons than anything. That had fixed everything. Well, almost everything.

"Thank you, Olaf," Elsa said, calling upon her magic to reconstruct the little snowman after what he went through. "You...you could have melted."

"Some people are worth melting for," he replied, smiling.

Elsa smiled back, for more than anything, the exercise proved the concept.

The next day, there were more remains of her frozen subjects gathered in her courtyard.

And the next day, there were even more.

Elsa did not notice it getting consistently colder, for the cold never bothered her anyway. She did not notice the snowstorms growing wilder and more frequent, for she was home in the wind and snow. She did not notice Olaf getting bigger, as more and more extraneous snow accumulated on his body due to the exacerbating weather. To her, the little snowman would always be her and Anna's little snowman, even as he grew large enough to fetch the books from the top shelf of the family library.

They were not always able to stop her failures from escaping. But that was fine. As far as Elsa knew, there was no one in Arendelle but her and Olaf. It soon became routine. Every morning, she woke and ate breakfast. Afterwards, she reviewed her notes from the day before, then consulted her books, breaking only for meals and to apply her calibrations. An adjustment to the magic circle here. An added word of power there. Convert polar to radians, square both sides, divide by zero...one day, the cold equations would set them free.

Let the storm rage on, for the cold never bothered her anyway.

**A/N: Google for "Do You Wanna Build A Snowman Reprise" for the song that she sings. It's a fanwork that someone else did, not my own creation.**


	4. Kristoff

**Chapter 4**

**Kristoff**

Kristoff did not know how long he and Sven had been going, only that it had been a long time since white had turned to green. He was just glad that he hadn't seen one of those _things _- Walkers, as the survivors of old Arendelle had taken to calling them. Huge, and white, with piercing blue eyes, gaunt frames that held frozen hearts, and an eerie _otherness_ to them. He still remembered the first time they had come across one - or rather, that one came across them. They had been traveling for several days. When a rustling was heard, the party thought it had been a straggler. They had passed by too many frozen corpses entertain the possibility of leaving a potential survivor behind. That "potential survivor" had lept out of the woods, roaring and screeching an otherworldly screech before claiming the lives of four other survivors, some civilian, other soldiers who found their steel useless against it, their blades shattering as soon as they contacted the aura of bitter cold emanating from its body.

Surprisingly enough, it was Prince Hans of all people who had the presence of mind to grab a torch on a wild hunch and clock it in the temple. The blow had stunned it, staggered it. "Fire, kill it with fire!" Hans had cried, and several others took up his call to arms. Two more had died before the creature was downed, but by then they had all learned.

Seven hells, Hans may have been a slimy _horunge_, but his leadership had gotten them out of the wastes of old Arendelle mostly intact.

There was a rustling sound from the woods in front of him, and reflexively Kristoff found his hand alternately going for his axe and his flint before finally settling on the axe. It had been days since he last saw a Walker, and it would just be silly to encounter one now. Besides, it would make no sense. There was always an aura of cold that preceded their appearance, and that had not happened.

Then again, it had been several days before the first Walker appeared without warning. But what he heard next erased all doubt.

"I see my esteemed uncles cannot wait for my father to be buried before moving upon his lands and titles?"

"Anna?" Kristoff whispered to himself. No, that would make no sense either. Anna was dead. He saw her frozen with his own eyes. But that voice sounded so much alike...

"Heh. Normally we wouldn't say, but seeing as you'll be dead soon anyway, I suppose it wouldn't matter. Yep, some old lord couldn't wait. Annoying git, too, wouldn't stop yammering about how the seed was weak and only left a single daughter unfit to hold a keep, and how the holdings might as well stay in the family instead of follow an outsider. Now you can make it easy on yourself and accept it. Or...you could make it harder and fight. And believe me, there's some of my men that would prefer you did..."

Kristoff narrowed his eyes. Anna or not, this was not happening again under his watch. There was a few minutes of shouting, followed by sounds of a struggle and some cries of pain, mostly male. But when a distinctly feminine cry was heard, he felt Sven snorting and pawing at the ground, and he knew he had to do something.

Boys will be boys, and boys will roughhouse. Thus when the boy who grew up roughhousing among hardy stone trolls, who grew into a hardy ice-harvester, who grew out of the hard winter of old Arendelle lept into the fray, it could only end one way. In a flash he was upon them, his axe rising up and knocking down, cutting crimson threads all across the forest floor before the sellswords knew what hit them. As they began to get their bearings, Sven had joined in, ramming, kicking, tossing. Soon they had fled, and Kristoff was left survey the remnants.

"I should go," Kristoff said, hooking his axe into his belt before holding him back from stripping the bodies of usable supplies. He was in civilization now, no longer a refugee fleeing for his life, and he needed to act like it.

"Stay, please," the girl said, climbing to her feet and keeping a hand on her temple, where a saber had found its mark. "You saved my life, and, well, I'm no lion, but I always pay my debts."

"Bad things happen to people around me," he had said. "You're better off staying away."

"Well, I'm still alive, so I'd say that's a pretty good start," she replied, shrugging. "And you look like you've been traveling a while. At least stay for a hot meal and sleep in an actual bed."

And so Kristoff spent the rest of the evening at Storm's End, where he learned of the ancient father, of the many uncles, of the only child who was unfortunate enough to be born a daughter. Of the machinations and childhood "mishaps" that had befallen her since her teenage years, when Mother had died and Father could not find it in him to take another wife. Of the newfound solution to their problems, the fixer-upper that had shown up in the midst.

And so, one year later, _Ser _Kristoff wed Chana Baratheon to become Lord Paramount of the Stormlands, taking the majestic reindeer rampant upon a field of gold as his sigil. He could not protect Anna of Arendelle, but he could protect Chana of Storm's End. Between his personal strength, Chana's mind for intrigues, and the fact that having a fiance staved off all but the most foolhardy rivals, they were relatively successful at this. Years turned into decades, and two became three, then four, then many.

But something kept nagging in the back of Kristoff's mind.

"I remind you of her, don't I?" Chana had said to him, one night. "No, don't stammer. That was hesitation."

"Chana, you know I love you-"

"You've done more than enough. Go. If old Arendelle is that important to you, go. Take a look. Take Sven. Take a guard, if you feel the need. We can handle ourselves." A mischievous look appeared on Chana's face, and Kristoff felt a pang, for he had seen the exact same expression on someone he used to know. "Ours, after all," She added, leaning forward to kiss him, "is the fury."

**A/N: Officially the halfway point, and a name gets dropped! Like what you see? Would you kindly go to tvtropes' fanfic recs for Frozen and make a listing here? Tack så mycket!**


	5. Hans

**Chapter 5**  
**Hans**

Summer arrived on the Southern Isles like it always did, born of sun and humid air and salty spray combining. But this time it brought with it a ship, a peculiar ship, for years thought lost, only confirmed as such because few would have the temerity to impersonate the royal sigil emblazoned upon the ship's main sail. As it weighed anchor, the prince who commanded the vessel, thirteenth in the line of succession, was pleased that a larger crowd than usual had gathered, hoping to catch a glimpse of the long-lost royal son.

"Salt and steel, Hans, what _happened_ to you?"

"Ehren," Hans replied curtly, dismounting from Sitron, then placing his left hand upon his heart and bowing lightly to his eldest brother. "It is good to see you too. How is Father?"

"Father has...passed on," Ehren replied. "But being that you of course had no way of knowing that, I will forgive the lack of groveling at my feet for now," he added, laughing to indicate that the latter half at least was merely a jape, and Hans joined him in laughter. "Come, little brother, Castle Pyke awaits, and our brothers will be glad to see you are well." _Will they?_ Hans wanted to say, but he held it in, as he always had. Instead, he said the safer thing.

"No, take me to the shrine first," Hans replied. "It has been too long, and after...after all I've seen, I really should count it my blessing to have made it back in one piece. Relatively speaking," he added, noticing a shift in Ehren's gaze to where his right shoulder now ended, followed by an awkward cough from his older brother as he pretended to not notice.

"I see you have become pious in your absence. Very well, little brother," Ehren replied, mounting his horse as Hans did likewise. It was but a short gallop to sandy beaches, and Hans had barely time enough to share a little of all the things he had seen starting from the voyage to Arendelle before the ritual was to begin.

_"Let Hans your servant be born again from the sea, as you were. Bless him with salt, bless him with stone, bless him with steel."_

"What is dead may never die," Hans replied solemnly as he felt the seawater upon his hair. The words were old. Simple. Familiar. Cliche as it was, Hans had to admit they gave him a sense of inner peace.

_"What is dead may never die, but rises again, stronger and harder."_

And there went the inner peace. Stronger? Harder? That thrice-cursed ice _witch_ took his arm. Not just any arm, his _sword arm_. He was not just anyone, but a _prince_ of the Southern Isles, of iron men who did not sow but reaved from wooden ships. That arm was no mere limb, it was the sole assurance of his standing among his people. The very fact that circumstances forced him to pay the gold price for an attempt at merely _a_ throne _anywhere_ was an affront to his pride, and now that she took his bloody arm, he would never have the chance to pay that shrew back in iron.

Granted, even if he still had his arm, he probably wouldn't get the chance anyway. The fjords were, from all accounts, perpetually frozen, and all the power of the Iron Fleet could not approach the Snow Queen in her castle of ice. But for now, Hans wanted to stew in his resentment, his rage, his hate for this frigid harpy who had ruined everything.

Ehren, of course, did not notice any of this. He was never the most attentive sort, having taken years to realize he in fact had a _twelfth_ younger brother. Besides, Hans had learned from living with twelve older brothers who played rough as brothers were wont to do, and had grown used to wearing a pleasant and dignified masque even when the kraken was awakening inside. So when Ehren clapped him on the shoulder - the good one - and smiled before offering to take him home, fully expecting that the slings and arrows of childhood would be remembered as just that, Hans smiled back.

_You know nothing, King Ehren._

Hans took one last look at the Order of Drowned Men before mounting Sitron and following Ehren down the cobbled path to Castle Pyke.

Mother had welcomed him warmly, as mothers were wont to do, and had to strain herself not to weep in front of a dining hall full of hastily assembled guests. For the first time in forever, the people had gotten someone who had returned from old Arendelle and was willing to share their experiences, so Hans indulged them. But through it all, he kept a careful eye on his brothers. One prince had ascended, but that left twelve princes, at least one of which had much to gain from an unfortunate accident, and it was always prudent to know what the others were thinking. As Hans joked and japed, made serious and somber, recounted and embellished, he was simultaneously pleased and irked to find that the more things changed, the more they stayed the same.

As thirteenth, he would never be anything more than the spare to the spare to the spare. An old horseshoe. The extra button on a coat. But there was something new here, beyond the old dismissal. _Pity_.

Hans laughed, both in reaction to a toast and a jest from a guest, and because pity was good from where he stood. The night eventually drew to an end, and when the last dessert was served, and most of the assembled lords were in their cups, Ehren suddenly stood up and began tapping on his glass.

"My father always said to me that friends will break, parents will age, and children will be ungrateful, but brothers stay with you forever," his eldest brother slurred, "and I've been blessed with twelve of them. So, in celebration of the return of youngest, dearest Hans, long thought lost to us, I hereby grant him stewardship of my old keep."

_Wait, what?_

"He may take his seat there, administering the lands for as long as his line extends."

_No no no this can't be happening._ Hans sneaked a glance at his brothers, all of whose eyes had narrowed. When ascending to the Seastone Chair, a king gave up his old castle, for now he was no longer lord of his own personal lands and holdings, but of the entire Southern Isles. Stewardship of his previous seat was considered a prestigious title - no, more than prestigious, a shoo-in for regency should something happen to the king before his heirs were of age. And come time for the Kingsmoot, well, any lord who was so trusted as to administer the previous king's holdings would be a strong contender. None of his brothers had really noticed him so far, and that was how Hans liked it. But if he were to be upjumped...

"I'm sorry, my lord brother, but I cannot accept." A wave of silence washed over the crowd. Hans smiled weakly and held out his arm. "Look at me, Ehren. I'm broken. Crippled. No longer whole. I can no longer command ships, lead reavers into the green lands," he said, reaching down into his cup and downing it in a single gulp. At the same time, Hans snuck a furtive glance at his brothers, noticing the tensions had been diffused somewhat. "But should you ever need a castellan to tend to minutiae, or a master of coin..." Ehren had begrudgingly acquiesced to that, and the brothers' eyes returned to old dismissal at the obvious lack of ambition.

_You know nothing, King Ehren._

Several weeks later, Janke died in a tragic sailing accident. Hans had nothing to do with it; the returned prince had been cooped up in the family libraries the whole time, and when the accident happened, he was at the shrines, praying to the Drowned God. And so the family wept, but moved on.

A month later, Georg and Gudmund ate some improperly prepared lutefisk and died. Hans, again, had nothing to do with it, having been sent off to negotiate trade relations with Wesselton. And so the family wept, but moved on.

In another month, Jaeger ironically died in a hunting accident when his brother Gunnar was cleaning his crossbow and it went off. Hans had nothing to do with it, in fact he had pleaded with them not to go, for there were rumors of man-eating grumpkinsnarks in the woods. The family wept, then drowned the Maester as punishment for his failure to heal the deceased royals, and then moved on. And when winter started, Helmut fell through some thin ice and froze solid before anyone could reach him. Hans had nothing to do with it, he was meeting with the newly arrived Maester to brief him on the situation at Castle Pyke.

Two months later, Franz rose up in rebellion against Ehren, and the resulting conflict claimed several more brothers, only becoming pacified when Hans rallied the militant arm of the Order of Drowned Men to Ehren's defense, for it was known that Frans was a flamboyant man of peculiar tastes, and no godless man may sit the Seastone Chair.

"How did it come to this?" Ehren asked, rage transforming to grief as it choked his voice. The battle had been bloody. It had been bloodiest of all in the throne room, and after it was all over Ehren had dismissed everyone else so he could share his grief with his "We...we were brothers. We were thirteen. And now we are down to two."

"You know nothing, King Ehren."

"What?"

Hans could almost picture the wheels turning in Ehren's head as he watched from across the hallway. Oh, poor, simple Ehren, always the eldest, always assuming he could demand and he would get. And now Ehren turned to him, sword in hand, murder in his eyes.

"For the record, Ehren, Gunnar and Jaeger wasn't me, those were just happy accidents," Hans said, smiling as Ehren grew closer and closer. The long-denied prince, formerly thirteenth in the line of succession, now merely the second, closed his eyes and _whispered_. And when Hans opened his eyes again, Ehren was collapsed on the ground, eyes wide open, mouth still gargling vomit and blood from when his heart collapsed.

"Why?" Hans thought he heard his brother ask, though it could very well just have been one final and futile attempt at breathing.

"No godless man may sit the Seastone Chair, Ehren," Hans said, calmly, pausing to wipe away the light trickle of blood that had flowed down his nose ever since he spoke that _word_. "For what it's worth, I _am_ sorry it had to end this way." He had learned his lesson from Castle Arendelle; explanations of plans were to occur only after their execution. "But life is too short to always be shut out by nothing more than accident of birth," Hans whispered, kneeling down to drape his brother over his shoulder. "And really, I've been more merciful than any of our other brothers would have been. Gunnar, at least, would not have settled for tansy when dealing with your heirs."

Hans paused for a brief second to close his eyes and savor the moment, before opening them up again. Ehren truly knew nothing. The Order of Drowned Men knew a little, but they had not come close to unlocking the true secrets of He Who Dwells Beneath The Waves. But Hans knew. He had known ever since that day in Castle Arendelle, when he witnessed firsthand the sheer power that magic could unleash, a power against which even kings must bend the knee. Yes, magic existed in this word. It permeated the fabrics of reality, and showed its favor to mortals who knew where to look. And Hans had looked, had spent the past several years looking, scouring the world to devour knowledge as the kraken that was his family's sigil devoured ships. Indeed, if Elsa of Arendelle could wield so much power without even intending it, then who knows what someone with less compunctions might do? No, the Southern Isles must have their own protection, and for lack of other, better qualified candidates, there was only one logical choice for the position.

King Hans of the Southern Isles paused to clear his voice, then kicked open the throne door.

"Summon the Maester! Please, someone, anyone! The pain and heartbreak, it must have been too much for my brother, and he collapsed as soon as it was all over…"


	6. Pabbie

**Chapter 6**

**Pabbie**

Stone was tough. Stone endured. But stone could be weathered, stone could be eroded, and the frozen heart was taking its toll upon the ancient troll kingdoms. "The night is coming, Kristoff," Pabbie, lord of the trolls, said as he carefully dusted the snow from his stony skin, "and our time is nearing an end."

"Don't say that, Grand-Pabbie," his son replied, though his expression betrayed the feelings in his heart, that he merely did not wish to admit what he had seen with his own eyes. "You're as much a part of this world as the earth and the trees."

"The earth, and the trees... Tell me, how much of that have you seen ever since you stepped foot in Arendelle?" Pabbie looked down, then beckoned Kristoff to him. "Come, walk by my side." His adopted grandson dutifully followed, and together they walked in silence for a while. Pabbie leaned down and grasped at the ground. "Look at this. What do you see, Kristoff."

"That's...a pebble, Grand-Pabbie."

"What do you think it was before it became a pebble?"

Kristoff was silent at this.

"Nothing is eternal, Kristoff. Not even us. Even stone can crack and weather and shear. We will not last through the night, Kristoff, but we can try to prepare you for a time." Pabbie sighed and shook his head. "Sometimes I look at the winter threatening to engulf us, and I can't help but blame myself. I should have provided more guidance to them."

"Wait, what do you mean?"

The troll lord looked back to his adopted grandson.

"I knew Princess Anna of Arendelle long before you brought her to me, Kristoff." And so he explained everything, of that fateful day when a king and queen brought one daughter to be healed and sought to avert an unenviable fate for another. The two walked together silently, until they had arrived at one of the formerly many heat vents that dotted the Valley of Living Rock.

"It's not your fault, Grand-Pabbie," Kristoff began, but Pabbie raised a hand to stop him.

"The past is in the past," Pabbie replied as he knelt to the ground and placed his hands upon the earth. "The ones you call Walkers. They grow more numerous each day, and they have been steadily encroaching upon our lands, bringing their unnatural cold with them. This is one of the last vents remaining, and it too will be covered. When they are finished here, they will march further south. Remember this, Kristoff. Against ice, fire." The troll lord concentrated, calling to the earth as he and his ancestors before him did in ages past, and heard it reply. Not feldspar. Not granite. Not sulfur. Not coal. Not diamond. Perhaps pumice, but it was too soft. Hundreds of rocks and stones sang their song, but Pabbie was looking for only one today.

Obsidian.

"Go, Kristoff. Spread the word. Bring back brothers, if you wish. We will teach them, if they can listen. But warn them, for the night is coming, and it will be dark and full of terrors."


	7. Bran

**Chapter 7**

**Bran**

"_Hyup! Ho! Watch your step! Let it go!"_

The Wall was going up.

One of the greatest feats of magic and engineering in the history of the kingdoms, all constructed by his hand. Majestic, they called it. Magnificent, they called it. Marvelous, they called it. Beautiful. Powerful. Dangerous. Cold. Even the Grand Maester of King's Landing was impressed with the design. Stone would crack. Wood would splinter. Straw was laughable. No material could weather the constant assault by ice - save for the ice itself, growing only stronger as the frozen forces crashed against it.

"_Hyup! Ho! Watch your step! Let it go!"_

There was a list of grandiose names being considered for the project. The Ring of Life. The Blessed Lady. There was talk of placing a set of cathedrals on it to mark the salvation it would bring to the peoples of the Seven Kingdoms. But in the end, it was only the Wall. It needed no empty boasts to attest to its capabilities, no vainglorious titles to announce its mission. It was a Wall. It would do what a Wall was supposed to do. It was a Wall, no more, no less. And it would have inspired pride inside Bran the Builder's heart, if its construction hadn't meant abandoning last dream and wish of the old man who he loved as a mentor.

"I'm sorry, Kristoff," Bran whispered, his thumb stroking the handle to the personal dagger he always carried. It was a finely crafted weapon, its blade of pure Valyrian steel, but that was not why Bran treasured. No, the dagger had been a gift, and though he had always told others that the handle was carved of a stag's antler, privately he always knew it belonged to a peculiar animal only seen in the far north, the majestic rain-deer. "They no longer have the stomach for this, and winter is coming."

There have been attempts to range beyond. Men, good men, had volunteered to ride into the frozen mists, to secure lost Arendelle, to resettle the lands of winter. They had made headway at first, and Bran smiled as his mind took him back to that first ranging. All the arrayed forces of the lords of the North had rallied to Bran's banners - Umber, Hornwood, Cerwyn, Mormont, and even Bolton, along with countless other lesser houses. Joining them were Kristoff's allies - Dondarrion, Penrose, Tarth, Swann, Selmy, and other Stormlords. Then there were the mountain clans, along with various hedge knights and lordlings of other kingdoms. There was even a contingent of crannogmen, with their peculiar little tridents and nets, though Bran was personally not sure what was the strangest to him, the Frey host that had arrived despite the threat of the long night still being but a rumor in many areas south of the Neck, the Dornishmen whose warmest clothing had still left them woefully underdressed for the excursion, or the Greyjoy reavers that had landed upon the Stony Shore, ignored the usual victims of their raids, and instead rode for leagues to link up with the assembled lords preparing to march north, never explaining what they were looking for in this land of frozen seas. Nonetheless, despite the host's disparate origins, together they had ridden, armed with dragonglass and dragonsteel and simple mundane fire, to split the ice apart and to cut through the frozen heart of winter.

They struck for love and struck for fear, but they were not prepared for winter to strike back.

Support from the lords of the north dwindled as their own lands became threatened by an icy force more foul than fair, and they recalled their banners for the sake of self-preservation. Support from the lords of the south dwindled as word came back from the survivors that there was no honor to be had in the ruins of old Arendelle, only darkness and terror and the fell grasp of the White Walkers. What might have been accepted as merely the risks of settlement elsewhere became singularly problematic when the dead would not stay dead, and the fires of the living were snuffed out by the raging snowstorm that engulfed each and every light went dark and became part of the cold.

Kristoff Baratheon was a good man who lived a long life, but he had not lived long enough to see his dream to an end, and now his dream was ending without him.

"Rest well, old friend. Rest assured that this will not be the end of it," Bran continued, determination upon his brow as he looked upon the massive structure of ice and artifice. "As soon as this winter passes, we will once again march forth. And so it will continue, until the Land of Always Winter sees the green of spring once more. Even if it takes forever." Yes, forever. He owed that much, at least, to the man who had taught him how to fight, how to range, how to live and love with no regrets. "This I swear, Kristoff, by the old gods and the new."

Yes, night was falling, and though Kristoff's watch was ended, others would stand in his stead, and their watch would begin, for this night and all nights to come.


End file.
